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A little background, I'm currently living in Washington, DC. I ate at a fairly nice restaurant and left 20% tip as I always do (I'm also a pretty easy customer). This server chased me out of the restaurant and asked "was there anything wrong with the service tonight?" I told him there wasn't, that's why I left him 20 dollars on the 100 dollar bill. He said that most of the people who eat there are Senators and it's customary to tip 30% at that particular restaurant. I asked him if he'd rather give me back my 20 and he left in a huff, calling me a cheap ass. Fuck that guy. Do you have any ridiculous wait staff stories?

At a Swiss Chalet, six of us at a table. Five plates come out. We wait a couple minutes for the sixth plate. We inform our waitress that we didn't receive our sixth plate. She responds with "Yes, you did." After a bit of a back-and-forth, she accuses us of hiding the last plate somewhere.

I think it's best to go back in and ask the manager what the typical tip was, then explain that the waiter came outside and embarrassed me in front of people by asking for more, and finish by saying I wouldn't be returning.

Yeah...but why should I care what a usual tip is....that waiter was an asshole....and the manager should care how his employees treat customers. Maybe I'm an asshole, but I would have taken the tip back and left zero.

I'm having trouble even believing this story... As a waiter I would be running out to give you your cell phone or credit card you left, not to demand more money. 20% is an awesome tip. It's what I shoot for.

Exactly. Speaking as a waiter myself this seems completely unbelievable. If true, then this guy's waiter was a total a-hole. You never chase after someone who left a bad tip (which he didn't, obviously), as it could easily cost you your job.

Living in a country where tips are added as service tax on the bill itself and later distributed amongst the waiters, I must say the whole thing sounds truly horrifying to me. It just seems like an unnecessary and bothersome tradition (just like not adopting the metric system) which should be overhauled. I can't imagine what it would be like to worry about what's an acceptable tip when I should be relaxing on an evening out.

I tipped over 100% once because I was at ihop with six other people and one of them threw up. On the table. It was her 21st and her friends were not really taking care of the situation they created.
I felt horrible for our waiter.

I supposed I technically tipped infinity% once. I was at a bar watching a buddy of mine play with his band. At intermission I was talking with him, ordered a beer, and got the 100% band discount. Nice! I tipped 5 bucks because (a) I don't see why the bartender should get stiffed just because I got comped a drink and (b) it made my friend's band look better because, hey, their fans tip well.

He did fail in his attempts to get me laid, however, so it wasn't a totally successful evening.

A lot of people forget to tip on comped drinks, so good job for doing that. I always feel bad at events like wedding, etc, when there's a bartender making free drinks next to an empty tip jar. I always tip if I have cash in that situation.

I agree except for one thing; Saying you won't return ensures them that there is nothing else for them to lose. Most of the time, when dealing with companies, you want to act like a loyal customer to get the best results in your favor. You can still negotiate.

You reminded me of the episode of Cheers where Carla approaches a new patron with "Welcome to Cheers... may I take your order?" The guy pulls out a stack of bills, puts it on the table and tells her "This is your tip. For every mistake you make, I take away a dollar." She replies, "Well then, let me save you some time," puts the money in his breast pocket, pours a beer on his head, and walks away.

I tipped 1$ for a 4$ breakfast consistently at a place that didn't seem to get or expect tips. One day the guy offered me a hot chocolate for free after I was done eating. When I was, he looked busy so I just left. I went up stairs and walked back to Canadian Tire (my work), walked all the way across the large store and almost made it to the employees lounge when he came running after me with the hot chocolate.

We took my wife's father out for birthday dinner one night. He chose the Olive Garden, so my parents and the in-laws met us there and we were seated at a big round table in the back of the restaurant. Our waitress came bouncing up and introduced herself, asked a few questions, and figured out that it was Bill's birthday. His 60th birthday. I noticed that she seemed to pause when she heard this, but she took drink orders and off she went.

Dinner progressed, but at some point she came back and dropped the fucking bomb: her own father had just died two weeks prior at age 60. We were all a little flabbergasted, but we offered our condolences and she turned it around a bit by reminding us all how precious we should be to each other, blah blah.

Not 5 minutes later she came back, and proceeded to fill us in on HOW he died: battling aggressive cancer for a year, he died a long, slow, painful death. Very sad. Again, birthday dinner and all, we managed to console her a little and ordered desserts.

Desserts come out, and she brings an extra-happy surprise: a printout of an email that her father sent her. You see, during his time in hospice, he sent her multiple emails daily telling her that he loved her, writing poetry and inspirationals. She saved them, leaving them all unread to go through after he passed. She proceeded to read this poem to us, which was very sweet I'm sure, but I could barely hear it over the blood pounding in my ears out of sheer embarrassment. I was staring at my plate by this point; I can honestly say it was the most embarrassed I have been since middle school.

As she had brought out the desserts, a bus/run guy had come through to clear a booth from the now empty section of the restaurant. About two lines into the poem, he stood up, looks over at her and said, "You're kidding." I glanced over at him and he gave me the most sincere "Oh Jesus I am SO sorry" look.

She finished the poem, we paid up, left a decent enough tip (probably around 20% because the service--grief aside--was good), and went home.

The next day, my wife gets a call from a manager. He asks if we had had any issues with our waitress the night before, and my wife very kindly explained that the woman was obviously still grieving and just happened to get a table that rang her like a gong. He explained that it was her first shift back since taking time off to grieve, and that we were her first table of the night.

Pretty cool of you guys to handle it that well (then again... what are you to do?). Even more cool of the manager to take the time to look up your phone number and give you an apology for her behaviour.

I think I'll join in with a good story in this part. Ridiculous, but ridiculously awesome.

I'm from Denmark, but I'd gone to London to visit some friends. Having looked around, we decided we'd go to Pizza Hut. We sat down, and a waiter comes up to our table and asks for our order. One of my friends decides he wants a small pizza, and the waiter stares at him for a bit, then goes "okay sweetie; I'll make sure it's extra crisp just for you". Our friend is bisexual, and we teased him a bit, telling him to get the waiter's phone number, and just generally messing about with him. He was not amused.

So, Kapil--as we found our our waiter was called--delivers our food to the table. He gets my friend's plate the last, and gets up very close to him, and puts it down with a hearty "Here you are, love" (all of this is is in an incredibly stereotypical gay voice with one hell of a lisp), winks at him, walks off to the kitchen. This was repeated, with several implied gay jokes when he asked for strawberry ice cream, as opposed to the chocolate the rest of us had.

He kept coming back, ensuring we had our drinks re-filled for the entire night and kept taking the piss out of my friend. We ended up having a picture taken with him, emptied out our pockets of change and dropped it in his tip tray.

We later added him as a friend on Facebook (yay, stalking). He's straight, and has a girlfriend.

Four of my friends and I sat down and ordered drinks. After 20 minutes one guy decided to order food. After another 20 minutes someone else ordered food. The food actually was kind of slow, but our waitress checked on us and let us know the order was in. She joked around with us a bit, was always on top of our drinks and gave us a couple free beers (somehow they poured too many behind the bar and were going to have to throw them away). We tipped $21 on a $79 bill.

We paid our bill in cash and told her to keep the tip. A couple minutes later she came back and asked if we knew how much we gave her. My initial thought was we either gave her $80 or $120 since we had been passing money back and forth to get the correct change (the waitress actually broke a $20 bill for us). Nope, she just thought we had tipped too much. We told her that's how good her service was. There's not a real point to this story, I just found it odd and positive.

I agree it probably wasn't "senators only"; I figure he meant congressmen/lobbyists/politicians generally who apparently tip better than students with no income out for one nice meal this semester. Who would have guessed?!

An old story: my ex's family (when she was a little girl) would eat at restaurants while traveling cross-country -- a single mom and seven kids. On one of the trips, one of the kids revealed that s/he had been picking up the money that mom had "forgotten" on the tables.

I was vacationing in Beijing where tipping is not part of the culture. I left the equivalent of a $5 tip for a $30 meal and as I was walking out the door, a waitress frantically chased me down and stuffed the tip back into my pocket telling me it was far too much.

I ate at a restaurant run by blacks aimed towards a white customer base. I ordered the fried chicken and got a lecture about how not all blacks like fried chicken and if I came there just to be politically correct I could leave. So, we left and told the manager what happened (also black) and he seemed pretty upset. We are weekly patrons and that was our first time with that waitress. Why is it not ok for white people to like fried chicken. =(

I ate at a restaurant run by blacks (in Harlem) aimed towards a black customer base and got the fried chicken. They were incredibly friendly and seemed almost pleased that I was there. It was delicious. And awesome.

Ate at a steakhouse in Phoenix one night after going to a play with my family. It was late and the place was nearly empty but the hostess offered to sit us anyway. My sister ordered some sort of fish and about 10 minutes later they came back and said they were out of that fish till the morning delivery. We didn't really think anything of it my sister just ordered something else and we kept talking. The staff was so apologetic that when the bill came they had comped my sisters meal and gave us $50 worth of gift cards. It was pretty awesome.

I was at a restaurant in Reno with some friends of mine, we had just hitch-hiked into town. We are all moderately "weird" looking, have huge packs on, piercings and tattoos, brown/black clothing, and probably don't look like the cleanest people in the world. We order a huge, huge meal to celebrate getting into to town and meeting up with a certain friend of ours. The waitress is an older lady who is fairly friendly, tops off our coffee consistently and gets our food to us promptly. We finish off our meal, leave the money on the table + a pretty healthy tip and head outside for a smoke. As we're sitting there right outside the restaurant the waitress comes outside and says, "come on guys, you gotta pay the bill now..." completely condescending. She assumed we didn't even pay. My boyfriend promptly walks inside, points to the table, and picks up the money we left and brings it to her. He asks again how much the bill was and counts it out so she sees him put the tip back in his pocket.

Oh, and this one time I was in a small town in Georgia and they had "freedom fries" on the menu. I laughed when I got up to the counter to order. The waitress called me scum and asked me and my friends to leave. Yep.

Me and about 5 or 6 of my friends went to Dennys after a concert one night and we all orderd food. The service was fair (not good not bad) and the food was good. At the end of are meal we all paid and was getting ready to leave and we all put the tip on the table it was a good tip somthing like 30% - 40%. So we all where gitting up from the table and the waitress came over and said in a pretty smug way "I know a tip is not mandatory but you guys could leave somthing." we all kinda took a look at each other and then i said "yeah your right a tip isnt mandatory." And then went back to the table and picked up the money.

Also English. I only tip if the service / food has been above and beyond what is expected, and I think that's how it usually works here. For example a waiter/waitress who has gone out of their way to look after you gets a tip; one who has done the bare minimum of their job description (which, after all, is what their wages cover) does not.

Yeah.. about 20 years ago my family waited over a 1 1/2 hours for our food to be delivered (dont ask me why, it's my Dad). The waiter was rude when we asked what was up, and constantly left us with empty drinks.

So, when we left we left no tip. We all went into the restrooms, and when I came out my Mom was standing there and we started talking. The waiter who was male, STORMS UP and gets right in my Moms face (less than an inch). Now, my Mom is a tiny woman and this waiter was a big guy and he started SCREAMING and her wondering where his tip was. I started to advance on him, but my Dad came out of the bathroom and literally picked the waiter up and threw him about 5 feet into a wall.

The waiter was fired on the spot, and we received free meals for a year.. but we never went back.

I used to work in kitchens as a line cook. Waiters used to piss us off all the time.

Coming in 5 minutes before their shift, during a rush, and ask for food.

Ordering food off the lunch menu when its dinner and not asking if that's ok.

During sunday brunch ordering food off the regular menu and not asking if its ok.

Being prissy and annoying.

I worked at one place that took a tiny percentage (2%) of the waiters tips to give to us cooks, which was a nice thing. Although some waiters wished they could give to us themselves. We would get an extra .25 cents or more an hour depending on our position and hours worked. However what one waiter found out, was that all the money from the waiters was not being given to us, instead it was put into an account that had thousands of dollars of tip money that should have gone to us cooks. What ended up happening was management threw a party, supposedly with our money. We had it at the restaurant, us cooks cooked the food, and it was only with the alcohol that was not very popular. I left shortly after.

I was a waiter for a while and I learned very quickly to take excellent care of my support staff. I always was nice and courteous to the cooks/dishwashers/busboys/and hostesses, and I often tipped them out a few bucks even though it wasn't required. And in return they always took awesome care of me. My tables were cleared first and re-sat first, if I needed a rush or side the cooks took care of me, I had it pretty easy just because I appreciated the people who helped make me money. I also made more money than my lazy co-waiters because I was flipping tables like a BOSS.

While I was never handed any money outright by waiting staff, I did appreciate the nice ones. The ones that when they had a spare moment would ask the kitchen staff if anyone needed drinks (non-alcoholic of course) or would help out with a salad or two. Those waiters were really cool, and we did help them out when we could. Slipped them something more in their meals, got their food out a little quicker (if we could), etc.

One chef I worked with made sure than no one screwed with the dishwasher. He made sure the waiting staff knew he would be highly pissed if the waiters treated him bad. As for us cooks, if we burned something in a pot, we cleaned it, not the dishwasher.

It really is a team effort, but sadly the majority of waiters I worked with looked down on the cooks.

Cooks always get fucked, hardest job in the joint for the least $$$. You can make guy the most beautiful steak he's had in his life, served by the rudest bitch, and she'll get a good tip, she wont give you shit.

Every restaurant I worked in (which was 8 years worth) no matter how many times the chef yelled at waiters, they still pulled the same shit over and over. Bloody bastards never learned.

Some of the waiters complained about the 2%, they felt as though they should not have to pay anything at all. Some of these guys were pulling $4-500 a night, yet complaining about giving us a small bit of that.

Though some 5 star/Michelin star restaurants do not have this. Everything is a well oiled machine with no problems as everyone knew what was what. No tips were allowed to be accepted. The flip side was that you got paid really well. The head chef made 150K at this place and a line chef (red seal certification) made 25-35 an hour.

I left like 2 bucks on a 6 dollar tab and the waitress made some crass remark on my way out, when her manager was right there. I turned around and asked her if she was being crass with me. I don't think she knew what the word meant. Then she said "sorry for the service" with a smug attitude. So I told her to give me the tip back. That's when the manager got involved as I started toward her (I'm a Marine vet, she's lucky I didn't bother her for a discount). So the manager comped the meal for both me and my friend and she gave us our cash back... All of it.

And before anybody might want to come in and call me a dick, I used to be a server and have put up with a lot of bullshit. 2 bucks on 6 ain't bad, especially when coffee is self serve

He complained about a 20% tip? I agree, fuck that guy. I'd call the restaurant and tell him he was a douche and that you're not going back there.
I can understand he'd be kind of pissed if you were a bitchy, hard customer or a huge group of people where a nice tip would have made up for it.

I have yet to come across a waiter/waitress that would deserve a $30 tip on a $100 tab. That's like saying they deserve 30$ + hourly wage for talking to me for about 5 minutes, taking my order to the kitchen, coming back with delicious steaks, refills of drinks and then returning again with the tab. Yeah, no way jose.

Worst time was at an Olive Garden. It wasn't even busy yet our waiter just wouldn't pay attention to my friend and I. He was busy fucking around with his friends. We tried waving our arms when he came close, yelling "waiter", even going right up to the bitch and telling him to get the shit we needed. We waited 20 minutes after finishing our meal, putting all our dishes on the edge of the table and glaring angrily around the restaurant to see if we could spot him. Eventually we just left not paying the tab because he was a douche and never showed up with it. Their loss for hiring incompetent idiots.

We have 3 small children. They are well-behaved, but typically kid-messy. We leave 30% or we don't go out with them, it's mostly for having to fetch all the extra straws and napkins and crackers, and cleaning up the inevitable spill.

thanks! we actually have a few local haunts where they will see us coming and run to open the door for us. my kids are polite and talkative, my youngest tells most waitresses that she loves them, and we hear constantly how they are everyone's favorite kids :) we try to be the opposite of 'those parents' with the hyper-annoying kids, but there are still messes, sigh.

Hey, I have no problem cleaning up your kids' messes as long as you're cool, tip well, and all that. And the way you treat your servers will certainly rub off on your kids; it looks like it already has, actually. Way to be a good parent.

Hell no, "it looks like it already has, actually" is a strong statement. It's complimentary and unexpected and doesn't deserve occupy in its own short sentence. I usually just upvote semicolons quietly; yours was especially well done.

As a support staff, I'm not really benefitting from your tip but I'd like to say thank you anyway for being aware of the fact that children contribute a lot of mess to a restaurant.

Once, I brought a child crayons and some paper to keep him busy. He and his sister broke all of the crayons, ripped up the paper, ripped the small styrofoam container the crayons were in and threw them around the restaurant while screaming. I work in a fine dining restaurant. The parents of these children are well-respected professors at the local university. They didn't even care. When they left, all the table cloths were stained in balsamic and tomato sauces, the chairs they had been sitting on were stained beyond repair and there was a trail of bread from their table to the washroom.

The (sort of) same thing happened to my grandfather, but he realized what was going on.

It happened in another country, although I cannot remember which. They went into an empty restaurant, wanting to check it out. Long story short, when they ask for the check repeatedly the waiter keeps saying he'll be right over with it. Half an hour later they decide to leave the still-empty restaurant and THEN they get chased out of the door with the check. Naturally, my grandfather pays, but he realized that the reason for them being kept in there was that the best advertisement for a restaurant is when people are in there, eating. They were avoiding making the place look empty and unwanted, by keeping my family there.

If you're getting bad service at a chain restaurant, ask the bartender or host to summon the manager on duty. Explain that your expectations are not being met. You're likely to get a free meal without having to walk out on a check. If the manager is unsympathetic, pay for your food, and then call his boss.

My wife and I once watched the entire waitstaff of a nearly-empty Cheesecake Factory goof around for 20+ minutes without offering us so much as a glass of water after we were seated. (It turned out that the new guy was confused about what section of the restaurant he was responsible for.) We didn't pay for that meal.

These restaurants would very much prefer that you go home happy and return some other time. A free meal is a small price to pay if it keeps you from cursing their name and swearing that you'll never set foot in their establishment again.

I was in Cancun recently, and we felt like dicks because most of us were poor college students and didn't tip the bottle service guys very well. Bottle service is pretty cheap in Cancun BTW. The last night we decided that we would tip well that night. We probably gave him a combined 300 pesos ($20) over the course of 2 hours. He basically brought us 2 (cheap) bottles and some mixers. We then asked for a third bottle and he said that we'd need to tip him much better to get a third bottle. He gave us this whole line about how he worked hard to get that table and it's the best table (it's not) and that he is losing money because we're not tipping high enough. He then said we could buy another bottle and brought us this list of overpriced Smirinoff and Bicardi, we say no thanks we'd like the well tequila (that was included in the bottle service). He made this huge thing about it and said that there had better be a big tip at the end of the night. We obviously didn't after getting the whole song and dance.

TL;DR Went to cancun, everybody at the clubs tries to scam you, and they're never happy no matter how much you tip.

One time a bartender didn't fill up my pitcher all the way, so I politely requested for him to do so. He started this thing about me complaining and why I'm making a big deal about it (when he was). He ended up giving me a dirty look after there was no tip; like he was surprised he got no tip for being a jerk.

Another time I left no tip because the bartender was badgering me about why I got kicked out of another local spot. She was trying to be cute making me call her ma'am and saying please ma'am just to get a beer. I wrote down on the bill "$0 Tip MA'AM". That was fun.

A couple months ago, I was working the register in a retail store. The customer's daughter (7-8 years old, not a preschooler) picked up a pack of gum and stuck the corner of it in her mouth. I said, "Please don't put that in your mouth." She put it back in the box, so I said, "May I have that, please?" and the customer said she'd pay for it while making it absolutely clear that she'd rather not. I told her it wasn't required and I could damage it out, I just couldn't have it out to be sold, and the customer started growing more agitated. At this point, the supervisor working the next register stepped in and said, "May I help you, ma'am?" The customer said, "My daughter put this in her mouth and this woman started FLIPPING OUT!" I said, "I'm not flipping out..." and she started yelling "YES YOU WERE!" and "I'M NEVER SHOPPING HERE AGAIN!"

Why is it always when someone else starts making a big deal of things that they start accusing other people of overreacting?

Probably because they know they've fucked up and want you to look bad so no one looks at them. They usually have some sort of persecution complex to go along with it. "I'm so nice and everyone is always so mean to me..." and the like.

I like to imagine them having some real crisis. Like they get a flat on the freeway while late for work. Would their heads explode? Would they just collapse from a massive heart attack? It makes me smile to think of it. Obnoxious overreacting is annoying but very amusing if you look at it right.

I live about 5 mins from this bar and was there a few days after this broke on reddit. I asked the bar tender what happened and it seems like it was blown out of proportion. It was a party of 8 people so you will often see that mandatory 18% gratuity tacked on and it's right there on the menu so you will see it before you order. I don't agree with this but I will go somewhere else if I see that, it's their prerogative.

Anyway, from what I remember what the bar tender said, they had quite a lot to drink and simply didn't have enough money to cover the bill which is why they made such a fuss over the whole thing. The couple were the ones to call the cops and it was NOT the pub who wanted them arrested - the cops did it because they were acting like drunk assholes out on the street after being asked to leave.

I took it with a grain of salt, I don't know what actually happened, but that's what I was told. It's a pretty nice bar when no one is in it.

That server was as an asshole. 20% is a tip for good service. I would call the restaurant and complain about that. As for my worst experience as a former server, it was the dinner rush in a fairly nice restaurant. I worked at a steakhouse in Manhattan but I'll start off by saying it was a chain steakhouse - not an independent restaurant. I think this particular chain has a total of 100 restaurants nationwide. Anyway, single woman in her late forties sits down at one of my tables. She orders a martini with six olives. I get it for her. She demands an additional glass of olives and I oblige. I go through my whole spiel about the steaks on the menu and the specials - showing her various cuts of meat and filets of fish. She tells me that what she wants is a salad - and then she went on to mention she wanted certain types of lettuce and certain types of cheeses as well as nuts in said salad. It wasn't on the menu and I tell her that I will see what the chef can do. She then orders prime rib and tells me it needs to be the end cut but that she wants it with gravy - not au jus and that she wants it rare. I go into the kitchen and explain it to the chef and obliges. I bring her the salad and another drink and ask her if everything is to her liking. No comment...she just keeps eating. About five minutes into her meal she starts ranting like a maniac calling me a fucking whore and throws her martini at my head. Management comes out, says, "Oh this one again...Ma'am we're going to have to ask you to leave." She gives me $1 tip. Her bill was $100. Her table actually did indeed cost me money that night because I owed the bartender more than that based on her two drinks. Apparently she did this sort of thing all the time and usually she was just asked to leave but somehow she wound up getting seated.

Servers are required to tip out a certain percentage of their liquor sales. If they sell $100 worth of liquor at a 2% tip rate, and a customer only tips $1, the server has to make up that other dollar.

Not sure if this counts as ridiculous waitress behavior, but years ago I was eating breakfast a bowling alley and found a piece of metal in my pancake. It actaully scratched my cheek and caused a little bleeding. When I complained the waitress said "Oh," took my plate and brought me the world's smallest glass of orange juice as compensation. I was 13 so I figured that was the best I could expect. I was miffed that I couldn't finish my pancakes, though.

I went to one of the hole in the wall korean restuarants here in Baltimore, MD and after a great meal and great service gave a $15 tip on a $45 meal... all was squared away and I thought things were just dandy. I went back there with some friends 2 weeks later, and literally got turned away...when i asked why, the woman (who had been my previous waitress) said that I was cheap and just shooed me/us away. I'll never ever go back there again....jeez what ungrateful SOB's some people are....especially since I'm a poor grad student who makes next to nothing.

My father and mother went to a popular Chinese restaurant in DC one Friday night in the 80s. This was a fancier-style place; my dad was in his Naval Officer's uniform, and my mom was in a nice dress. When they went in, the host showed a bit of disdain for my parents and sat other people for almost 20 minutes before finally getting them a table. When they got the table, it was a cramped table in the corner next to the kitchen. The waiter that took care of them also was pretty rude and dismissive throughout the night.

At the end of the night, they got their leftovers to go, and my dad paid the bill. My dad gave him a decent tip, even with the crappy service - 15%. My parents, however, were staying at the table and finishing their drinks. Meanwhile, he sees the waiter talking with the host, and gesturing angrily at the bill. The host comes over, and asks if there was something wrong with the service. My dad tells him that the service was not good, but felt that he tipped decently regardless. The host explained "sweetly" that it was customary to tip 20% at the minimum in their restaurant. My dad offered to change the tip on the bill, and reached for the credit card slip. The host jerked the slip back, and said that would not be necessary, and left.

My dad saw the host go back and argue with the waiter. He then gestured towards them, and my dad guessed that they were going to try and take the leftovers back. My dad palmed the fork from the table, and waited to see what happened. The waiter walked by and leaned towards the table, and my dad growled, "Try it, and you'll walk away with a limp and a four holes in your hand." The waiter made a quick about-turn from the table, and my parents left a few minutes later.

This reminds me of an 80's restaurant story with my folks. They went to Ponderosa, a mid-west steakhouse that was always just OK. They placed their order and waited and waited and waited. When the food finally came out the chop was bloody and uncooked. Pissed with the service and knowing he'd have to wait longer before it the food would get fixed properly, he took the steak knife, pinned the chop to the wall and left.

If a waiter did this to me, I would have went back to the restaurant, demanded to see the manger, rage, and demand the tip back.

At an airport, they have the guys out front that will grab your bags for you; work for the airlines, but expect tips (don't see them everywhere). Anyway, in Kentucky, this guy grabs my bags (doesn't even ask). I tell him I got them; he insists. Then he stands there expecting a tip. I simply walked off. He kept saying "I'll get these for you!" as I was walking away. I kept yelling "thank you!" Yes, my bags showed up on time :) Had they not, I would have raised hell.

Positive story: Driving up to Virginia and stop at a Red Lobster. The meal is taking a while and the waiter keeps apologizing. I keep telling him "dude, it's okay, seriously. We're traveling and it is just nice to be out of the car. No worries. We're not in a hurry." He keeps bringing bread and filling drinks. The meal was a little slow getting to us, but not anything I would consider out of the ordinary. Anyway, instead of a check, the manager comes out and explains that our waiter said we had to wait far too long for our meal and that it was on the house, sorry for the inconvenience. I told him "seriously, it was fine! No problems, we didn't wait long at all, service was fine." Manager insisted we not pay. Left the waiter a tip larger than the cost of the meal.

I was out on a double date with the woman who would become my wife and another couple. My order alone was not simple but other girl's order was pretty complex. The waiter was just listening and going "uh huh" after every few words when I said, "Don't you think you might want to write this down?" to which he replied "Nah, I've got it."

Well, surprisingly enough, he didn't have it. He brought me a dish completely unrelated to what I ordered.

"This isn't what I ordered."

"Yes, it is."

"No, it isn't. Perhaps you would know what I ordered if you'd written it down."

By the time my order was corrected, my pre-wife and friends had already finished their meals. Then he brought the bill, which included being charged for the original, incorrect order.

"Go get your manager."

"Why?"

"Because this is ridiculous. You're charging me for my order and the incorrect order."

The manager comes over and apologies profusely. He tells the waiter to create another ticket without the incorrect order and offers me some gift certificates ($30 worth, not bad) for the inconvenience. The waiter brings me the new ticket and I notice there's an 18% automatic gratuity tacked on. I look at the previous, incorrect ticket...and there is no automatic gratuity. In other words, this asshole waiter tagged on a tip hoping I wouldn't notice because he sure as Hell wasn't getting one from me. I pointed it out to the manager and the look on his face said everything. He took the ticket from me and said, "Dinner's on me, sir, enjoy your evening." I'm pretty sure somebody got fired.

Out to lunch with some co-workers at one of my favorite local eateries. I was trying to get the waitress' attention because I ordered a grilled steak burrito and got a grilled chicken burrito instead. The place was packed, you could barely hear yourself think. So I called out: "Miss! Miss!" and raised my hand in the air. By instinct, I snapped my fingers, as well.

Apparently this is like the cardinal sin of being a restaurant patron. She literally stomped over with this sour look on her face and tartly said: "Don't...snap." I can't convey in this font the intensity of the words. "I'm sorry," I offered, "it's just really loud and I couldn't get your attention and my order is wro..."

"Don't snap." she said as she cut me off. "Just because I work for tips and get paid like crap doesn't give you the right to treat me like I'm your personal servant."

"Wha...you know what? Just take this back and get me grilled steak burrito."

I got my burrito (which she probably spit in) and didn't leave a tip.

In defense of the good, hard-working waiters/waitresses everywhere I offer the sorriest tale I've ever encountered. This alone made me want to make sure to leave a good tip.

Like most college students, I was pretty low on cash. So my friends and I loved Ryan's. The food wasn't very good, but it was plentiful and cheap. So when we'd scrap together a little cash, off to Ryan's we'd go.

We showed up on Sunday afternoon just as the church crowd was leaving and were taking our seats at a recently-vacated table. Our waitress was a lovely young girl. I remember thinking she was in one of my classes, but I couldn't remember which. Anyway, as we were getting ready to tell her our drink order she said, "Hey...guys...I know you don't know me, but I just need to get something off my chest."

This was completely out of the ordinary, so of course we were completely attentive.

"The folks who were sitting here before you just tipped me with food stamps."

My roommate was the first to speak. "You are fucking kidding me."

"Nope. Food stamps. And it wasn't even 10%. It was a family of 8 and they left me a $5 food stamp."

My hats off to you, waiters and waitresses. You work a pretty thankless job on average. And to those of you who provide crappy service and think tips are a given, go blow a hobo.

My wife and I once went out to eat at a restaurant near where we lived. We were both seated fairly quickly and opened our silverware while waiting for our server to arrive. I noticed my fork was slightly dirty, like the dishwasher hadn't completely cleaned off all the old food. Now, I didn't for a moment think that I was intentionally given dirty silverware... and when the server came to take our drink order, I politely said, "Excuse me... but this fork is dirty. Could I please have another?" She smiled, said, "Sure!" and left. She came back a minute or two later and placed another set of cutlery on the table. "Here you go," she said. She then put a glass full of hot soapy water on the table, and said, "That's if this set isn't clean enough for you."
My wife and I looked at each other, got up without saying a word, and walked out.

Jesus, as a restaurateur I can assure you I would have fired that person on the spot. None of my staff have EVER done that even when they get stiffed on a tip! This guy needs to find a new job, seriously.

I went to TGI fridays and ordered a drink. The waiter gave me a hard time about my ID , so much in fact by the time I got the drink, I just drank it and paid for the one drink and decided to leave.

As I was leaving he ran up and said " thanks buddy so much for the tip, I just want to thank you so much for your kindness"

I became fairly enraged, loudly I said " When you are total dick to the customer don't expect a tip and I hope your manager and co workers can hear what a terrible person you are to the customer, Im going to go home and make sure this is well documented and reported, my friends with me will do the same"

30% Damn. I only expected 15% when I waitressed, and I almost always tip 20% when I go out, and get thanked multiple times for it. I also served people in government positions, because I worked down the street from the State capital. I never expected that much. I was always thankful for what I got.

I was in Buffalo with my cousin, and we're taking a taxi cab home (from a night of drinking, granted)

We get to my parents' place, and the tab is cost is $14.80. All of a sudden, the doors lock on us. My cousin gives him $15, and starts fumbling around for singles to leave the cab driver. I try to leave the cab, but am unable with the locked doors.

"You punk kids are so f---ing cheap!" yells the cabby in return. My cousin and I agree that this bit of anger does not actually merit a tip, so we try to leave (again with no avail with the doors being locked). "F--- you cheap punk kids, I oughta kick you in your throat!"

The cab driver refuses to let us leave, so my cousin starts fighting him physically to try to let us out.

Long story short, I ended up in jail over 20 cents, and my career has been tainted.

I went to a wing joint that was a bar/restaurant with plenty of TVs for sports to watch a stanley cup playoff game. I'm there with 5-10 people all eating appetizers or entrees and drinking beer. My wife was drinking her beer when she felt something funny go down, and she still had a piece in her mouth. She took it out, and it was a piece of glass. We talk to the manager and tell him that there was glass in her beer (impossible to see by the way), and he offers to replace her beer. I then try and explain that she swallowed glass and after some talking and comments from him like "you'll be fine" (to which my wife replied "have you ever swallowed glass?") we managed to get him to comp our meals and drinks (just what we ordered, not my friends mind you). He acted like we should be grateful for him for getting a free meal after my wife swallowed glass. My wife was furious at the manager who was completely unresponsive to any complaints, and this totally ruined what turned out to be great hockey game.

Within a couple of days of all of this happening my wife started having some slight stomach pains that weren't going away. I wasn't sure if it was related to the glass so we went to doctors to be sure. After they weren't sure what it was she told the doc about the glass incident and they did a few more tests. They concluded that she passed the glass and on its way out it probably made a minor cut in her intestines. Awesome. The good news was that it would just take some time to heal, and nothing extra was needed. I can't stand the fact that my wife had to go through some very uncomfortable tests because this restaurant had pieces of glass in their cup and the manager was extremely unapologetic.

After all of this I went back to the restaurant and tried to explain to the manager how much crap he put us through and he still tried to pass it off as inconsequential. I proceeded to tell him to fuck off and that I nor anyone I knew would ever come to his restaurant again.

This wasn't the first time I had been given grief from the manager either, but the other offenses were minor compared to this. And the worst part is that all of the wait staff there are great, and they realize that they have one of the worst managers ever. The wait staff has apologized to me for their crappy manager in the past.

tl;dr

My wife swallowed glass while drinking beer at a restaurant, and the manager didn't give a shit.

One time the whole family was eating out in a somewhat upscale area with a lot of tight-ass retirees, and dad left about a 25% tip because the waitress was just really exceptional at handling our large party in addition to so many other people (I think she, the bus boy, and the owner were the only ones out handling about 10-15 tables).

She came running out with the tip thinking we had left without taking our change. She almost cried when dad told her it wasn't a mistake (the tip was close to $100). Apparently that was close to what she makes waiting tables for the entire night, because all the penny penching old farts tip around 5-10%.

I guess the ridiculous part was dad couldn't believe she came out to correct the 'mistake'...then again, that's why she earned the tip, heh. Pretty sad how some misers are willing to pay for good food but not tip the servers (fixed income my ass).

I was at some college-town type restaurant in Lansing and ordered nachos or something similar. After I had them a couple minutes, I noticed there wasn't any sour cream on them or on the side, and I remembered that from the menu.

When the waitress came by, I asked if she could bring the sour cream, and she responded that it didn't come with any. I said "I think it did..." and then I noticed the menu still on the table, which confirmed that it did, and so I picked it up and said "yeah, it says here on the menu."

The girl got irate and stormed off to get me some sour cream which she loudly THAK'd onto the table. After she walked off, a couple people from the party I was with told me that I was the rude one for pointing this out.

My friends and I went to a restaurant with 6 people. This restaurant is kind of an "art scene" restaurant, but defiantly portrays itself, and prices itself, as a gourmet restaurant. The place was not extremely busy, probably 60-70% to max capacity on a Friday night. Our waitress comes by to take our drink orders and we order 2 pitchers of beer. 20 minutes later we get our drinks. That's not a huge deal, but somewhat confusing considering they were that busy, but we let it slide. She takes our orders once she delivers the beer and its all typical stuff; an appetizer and entrees for everyone. The appetizer, which was the price of a full mean, was supposed to be gourmet crackers and cheese, but literally was club crackers and frozen, yes frozen, cheese. On top of that, she didn't even bring out the entire appetizer and we had to ask for it. Then, after 30 minutes, we get ONE plate out of SIX and she just sits it in front of one of our guests. After 10 minutes of the food just getting cold in front of him, we insist he goes ahead and eats. It takes 45 minutes until we get the rest of the food and one of the orders was extremely incorrect. One of the orders didn't even have all the listed ingredients in it. It was a cheese steak without cheese. She asked to have her order fixed the right way and the waitress gives her this snarky look and says, "Maybe you should go to drive-thru next time." Everyone was shocked and offended by her remark. We had waited on our food for a little under 2 hours and she is getting mad at US. So I did what I thought was the most appropriate; I wrote, "DRIVE-THRU" on her tip.

TL;DR: Table of 6. Food comes out at various times. Getting food + drink takes a little under 2 hours. When asked to fix an order, waitress tells us to "Go to Drive-Thru next time."

I went to a college restaurant where I ordered an ice cream sundae and my girlfriend ordered fries (we were going to a show and didn't want to fill up). This restaurant is usually filled with people from 19-25 who have no money, make a lot of noise and don't buy much. I saw my sundae sitting on the bar when my girlfriend's fries came after just under ten minutes. I waited another five minutes, asked three waitresses if they would please bring it to me, and finally had to find the manager and ask if I could have my melted sundae, please. When we paid we didn't tip and the manager got all up in a huff.